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The first confirmed recordings of lunar impact flashes were by amateur astronomers in the US during the Leonid meteor shower of November 1999.

Dr Cook’s latest sighting, the first in the British Isles, has been corroborated by a team of Italian astronomers.

It also forms part of a final year research project undertaken by astrophysics student Matthew Menzies who is looking at ways of improving how these impacts are recorded and measured.

The findings will be presented at the European Planetary Science Congress in Riga, Latvia later this year.

Space scientists at Aberystwyth University have reported what they believe to be the first confirmed sighting of a Lunar Impact Flash to be recorded in the British Isles. (Image: Aberystwyth University)

Dr Cook said: “Lunar Impact Flashes are notoriously difficult to record. The meteorite would be travelling at anywhere between 10 to 70 km per second as it hit the surface of the Moon. That is the equivalent of travelling from Aberystwyth to Cardiff in just a few seconds, and the resulting impact would be over in a fraction of a second.

“A similar meteorite hitting the Earth’s atmosphere would produce a beautiful shooting star, but as the Moon has no atmosphere it slams into the surface, causing a crater the size of very large pot hole. Just under 1% of the meteorite’s energy is converted into a flash of light, which we were able to record here in Aberystwyth.”

Impact flashes are so faint that they are only visible on the night side of the Moon using a telescope. A sighting can only be confirmed if it is seen from more than one location.

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Dr Cook said: “A single image is not enough. Cosmic rays in the form of radiation from space can produce very brief flashes of light and it can be very difficult to tell the difference between a real impact on the surface of the Moon and a cosmic ray. When you have two images taken at the same time, by different telescopes, looking at the same part of the Moon, you know it is actually on the lunar surface.”

Dr Cook’s work could prove invaluable should humans decide to colonise the Moon.

Dr Cook said: “The data we collect will enable us to understand better the nature of these explosions and protect future Moon bases or space craft.” As early as 1178 monks in Canterbury noticed a plume of light on the edge of the Moon, the British amateur astronomer F.H. Thornton saw a brilliant flash of light inside the crater Plato in 1948, and in 1953 American amateur astronomer Leon Stuart photographed a long duration flash near the lunar crater Pallas.